Qua Austin never taught school. Nor was she a school principal or someone with formal training in education.
Even so, it would be difficult to overestimate her impact on the education of children in Columbus and Lowndes County.
Austin, 72, passed away early Saturday, surrounded by family in the home of her only son, Curtis Austin Jr., in Washington, D.C.
“She was an inside outside person,” said Mike Neyman, former executive director for Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science. “Inside, it was her own kids. Outside, it was all the kids at MSMS and the kids at public schools, too. Her commitment to her kids extended to all the others.”
Qua Mattix was born in Columbus but spent her formative years in West Point and Greenville. She returned to Columbus after her marriage to Curtis Austin Sr. Both had a shared interest in improving their community, although each approached it in a different way, a way which suited their personalities.
Curtis Austin Sr., who died in 2010 at age 60, was more introverted and reticent. He impacted the community institutionally as an attorney, city council member and municipal judge. Qua was engaging, outgoing and used those traits as an advocate for education and arts in the community.
Whitney Austin, 41, described her parents’ relationship as yin/yang.
“My dad was more introverted,” she said. “Interacting in the community was not his thing, but it was something my mom, being an extrovert, very much wanted to do. She was very good at it.”
Initially, Qua helped out with her husband’s law practice. When her children came along, she devoted her attention to their education, first at Demonstration School then later MSMS, where her three oldest children attended. Later still, she helped in the Columbus city schools, especially the district’s special needs programs.
“Even until the end, she was extremely devoted to her family,” said Curtis Jr., the eldest of Qua’s four children. “There were recurring themes in her life, most of all education.”
With children as the focal point, Qua became one of the most familiar faces in the community, using her intelligence and the force of her personality to support arts, music and community service in myriad ways.
She was rarely a passive, behind-the-scenes player.
When there was an uptick of crime in her neighborhood, she partnered with a neighbor, Julie Parker, to form a neighborhood watch group. As a board member for the Columbus Arts Council, she helped raise funds for the organization’s events and educational programs, especially the Suzuki Strings group. In the years before she moved to northern Virginia to be near Curtis Jr. and Whitney, she served on the board of My Book of Lowndes County, which provides books to local first-graders.
‘You could count on her’
It is not uncommon to have parents who are involved in their children’s schools and education, but in Qua’s case that interest endured long after her own children had moved on.
“She was super smart,” said Betty Bryan, who taught music at the Demonstration School. “She was devoted to making sure her children had every advantage she and her husband could give them, especially educationally. She would not accept anything less than the best. Her standards were high and she held others to them. By doing that she enriched the lives of everyone in the community.”
For Alma Turner, the long-term principal of Demonstration School and member of the Columbus Municipal School District Board of Trustees, Qua was a principal’s dream.
“She was always involved and always had the best interests of the Demonstration School and the students in mind,” Turner said. “She worked very hard on behalf of them. She was always there — school meetings, events, outings. You could count on her.”
It was much the same at MSMS.
“Curtis (Jr.) was at MSMS my first year there,” Neyman said. “I hadn’t met his mother, but one Friday afternoon, I got a call from (Qua) asking me if I would do something for her. I asked her what I could do. She said, ‘I want you to find Curtis Jr. and tell him to call his mother!’”
From that point on, Qua became a fixture at MSMS.
“She made it a point to know the names of every kid and was very visible on campus,” Neyman said. “Any time I needed assistance, she would raise her hand.”
‘Facebook before there was Facebook’
Qua’s devotion to education took on an extra dimension with the birth of her youngest child, Rebecca, in 1985. Rebecca was born with spina bifida and as she began school, Qua quickly realized the quality of education provided for special needs students often left much to be desired.
“My relationship with Qua started when Becky was little,” said Leslie Junkin, director for the Mississippi Parent Training Information Center, which provides support for disabled/special needs students and their parents. “She came into school at a time where students with special needs still weren’t welcomed. It was an antiquated way of thinking: ‘Poor things. Just give them what we can and let it go.’
“Qua made great strides in getting support for those students and providing what they needed. She was someone we all looked to as a guide as to how to get children into these programs. She would take a stand and stick to it. She never gave up, not even after (Rebecca) passed away (in 2015 at age 30). She was still an advocate for access to the community, not just in education, but in life.”
Curtis and Whitney said their mom had a special capacity for bridging the gap between what people needed and resources.
“For better or worse — and I like to think better — she was a people connector,” Curtis said. “She was Facebook before there was Facebook. She had an immensely powerful mind and memory, which allowed her to acquire and retain a considerable amount of information.”
Part of Whitney’s education included taking violin lessons, something her mom encouraged her to do.
She joined the Suzuki Strings program where Diane Ford was her teacher.
“Her two oldest girls, Whitney and Jessica, took lessons and Qua was very involved, very much a hands-on supporter of the Suzuki program,” Ford said.
Jessica passed away in 2019 at age 38.
Whitney continued to take lessons and perform with Suzuki Strings through high school. Looking back on it, she said, her mother’s encouragement to stick with the violin lessons went beyond music.
“I think what she instilled in me with the violin lessons was work ethic,” Whitney said. “It’s something I’ll always carry with me. It created in me a confidence that I could go for the things I wanted if I was willing to put in the work.”
Carter Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements, which will be announced at a later date. In lieu of flowers, the Austin family has requested consideration of The MSMS Foundation, Camp Rising Sun and the Mississippi Civil Rights Museum.
Changes have been made to this story since its initial publishing to correct Qua Austin’s place of birth and Jessica Austin’s age at her death. We apologize for the errors.
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].
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